A location-based organization (LBO) is an organization that generally operates out of a physical location, and that generally relies on the presence of people at that location to facilitate its operation. At any given time, an LBO has an operational status such as open or closed. When an LBO is open, the LBO generally expects select people to travel to and attend the LBO to facilitate its operation. When an LBO is closed, the LBO generally does not expect, and may even discourage people from traveling to and attending the LBO. Typically, an LBO maintains a schedule indicating when the LBO is expected to be open or closed. However, in some instances the LBO may decide to deviate from this schedule and change its operational status with little or no notice.
An example of an LBO is a school. Generally, a school relies on the presence of staff and students to facilitate its operation of educating students. Typically, a school maintains a schedule indicating on which days the school is expected to be open (commonly referred to as “school days”), and on which days the school is expected to be closed. As such, on any given school day, most of its staff and students are likely to travel to and attend the school. However, as discussed above, in some instances, a school may deviate from its schedule. For example, in response to weather conditions (e.g., a severe snowstorm), as a safety precaution the school may close on a day that it was otherwise expected to be open. The school may then cause dissemination of a message, which indicates the school's closed operational-status. The school may cause the message to be disseminated with the intent that targeted recipients (e.g., the staff and students) receive the message and as a result, refrain from traveling to the school. For example, the school may initiate a phone tree to disseminate the message or may provide the closed operational-status to a news organization that may in turn, disseminate such a message, such as via television-broadcast.